• The former White House national security aide Sebastian Gorka on Sunday said he had left Fox News, where he was a frequent guest.
  • He said he was leaving to focus on a nationally syndicated radio show and his role as a contributor at Sinclair.
  • In a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference last week, Gorka claimed that Democrats like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez were plotting to ban hamburgers and pickup trucks.
  • In furious emails, Gorka lambasted journalists seeking comment on the departure, accusing one of being in a “drug-induced haze.”

The former White House adviser Sebastian Gorka on Sunday announced his departure as a Fox News contributor.

The exit capped a wild week, in which he made a fiery speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference accusing Democrats like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of wanting to ban hamburgers.

In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter on Sunday night, Gorka said he was leaving Fox News, where he was a regular contributor on Sean Hannity’s show, to focus on new media roles.

“I decided not to renew my contract since I have a new nationally syndicated radio show and a position with Sinclair TV which obviated a new arrangement with FNC,” he told the outlet in an email.

Gorka served as a deputy adviser on national security in President Donald Trump's administration, a role he left in August 2017.

He took up the job as a national security strategist with Fox News in November that year, according to his LinkedIn profile, returning to the network where he had been a frequent guest before Trump's election victory.

The profile said he had worked as a nationally syndicated radio host "on the front-lines of the Culture War" with Salem Media Group since January.

Fox News confirmed the move to the media-monitoring website Mediaite on Sunday, and Gorka reportedly responded to a request for comment from the site with a furious email accusing the reporter of being in a "drug-induced haze."

Gorka did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment from Business Insider.

A Fox News spokesperson confirmed to Business Insider that the network and Gorka had parted ways, and described the departure as a "mutual" decision.

Gorka appeared on Jeanine Pirro's Fox News show on Saturday, praising Trump's two-hour CPAC speech, and last week as a guest panelist on Hannity's show, where he attacked "socialists" as the biggest threat to America.

Citing multiple Fox News sources, The Daily Beast reported in August that Gorka had been banned as a contributor on the network's hard-news shows.

In the statement Sunday, Gorka said he would continue to appear on Hannity's prime-time slot and other programs on the network "as a free agent" and "as my new schedule permits."

Gorka on Thursday sought to burnish his credentials as a hardline conservative in an address to the CPAC conference in Maryland with an attack on those he dubbed "socialists" including Ocasio-Cortez.

"They want to take your pickup truck, they want to rebuild your home, they want to take away your hamburgers," Gorka told attendees.

"This is what Stalin dreamt about but never achieved. You are on the front lines of the war against communism coming back to America under the guise of democratic socialism."

A Breitbart and Fox News contributor before his White House appointment, Gorka defended Trump in a series of combative TV interviews during his tenure in the role.

But experts questioned his academic credentials, and he left soon after John Kelly took the role of chief of staff following the ousting of the populist firebrand Steve Bannon, a key ally of Gorka's.